


Silver and Wine

by popgothika



Series: Hunger [2]
Category: Twenty One Pilots
Genre: Angst, Blood and Gore, Cannibalism, Crying, Domestic Murder Buddies, Drama, F/M, I did her dirty, Jenna deserves better than I give her, Multi, Pining, except maybe not, whoops
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-03-26
Updated: 2018-03-26
Packaged: 2019-04-08 07:29:53
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,582
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14100417
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/popgothika/pseuds/popgothika
Summary: "I want to go out.""What?" Josh startles from where he was watching the trails of blood slide molasses thick and sweet down his arms."I'm still hungry. I want to go out." Tyler stretches, fingers twined, arms high until his spine pops. "I'm going to shower and then we can go to a club."Josh blinks, "Okay." It's better to not question Tyler when he's like this. Last time that happened, Josh ended up with six stiches.





	Silver and Wine

**Author's Note:**

> A long awaited (by like, three people) second part of the cannibal thing.

It's been three days since they've spoken to each other. Three days since that pretty little bird stopped singing. 

Three days since they fought. 

They never fight, not like this, and Josh regrets almost all he'd said in the heat of the moment. Tyler though, Tyler is a wall of ice, face unchanging and hands pick, pick, picking at the fabric of their couch. It's starting to make Josh crazy. If only he could say something to fix this.

The words don't come out and the silence stretches like rubber between them.

"Do you... do you like it?" The rubber snaps and the unexpected whiplash of Tyler's words startles Josh.

"What," Josh clears his throat, "what do you mean?" The stain on the carpet from a spilled can of RedBull is suddenly very interesting. It almost looks like a cat if he tilts his head slightly to the left. Or maybe a fox?

"Do you like bringing me dinner? Would you, I dunno, prefer it if I went out sometime?"

"Tyler, I... don't mind. I know what you like and what you need. It's fine. I like taking care of you." There's dirt under Tyler's fingernails, Josh knows how it got there, there's the same dirt under his. That dirt is the reason they're even talking about this. 

Why can't they stop talking about this?

"But what if I want to take care of you? Get you what you need?" Tyler's brows knit together. 

Josh couldn't help it, he snorts, ugly and deprecating. "You can't give me what I want."

That makes Tyler's brows unknit, smooth into something softer, less calculating, more... human. Less ice and stone and robot. He doesn't say anything else and Josh is left to wonder what his face gave away.

~~~

Three months pass and things are never quite back to normal, well, as close to normal as they get. Josh picks up a hitchhiker and watches Tyler shred into him with an animal urgency he almost never has with meals. He's savage and vulgar, slurping blood from cupped hands shoved deep in a squirming stomach cavity while Josh watches quietly from the bottom of the stairs.

He's beautiful, gore streaked across pink lips and sticking to stubble, fingers twitching around the heart he's currently cradling like a newborn in his hands, blasphemous words spewing from his lungs that make Josh bite his lip and press the heel of his palm hard against himself so Tyler doesn't see, isn't allowed to see, when he turns around. 

And Tyler does turn.

His eyes, normally bright and calculating are deep, void pools of something more than bloodlust, something more primal that won't be sated with one scrawny hitchhiker. 

"I want to go out."

"What?" Josh startles from where he was watching the trails of blood slide molasses thick and sweet down his arms.

"I'm still hungry. I want to go out." Tyler stretches, fingers twined, arms high until his spine pops. "I'm going to shower and then we can go to a club."

Josh blinks, "Okay." It's better to not question Tyler when he's like this. Last time that happened, Josh ended up with six stiches.

Tyler nods, accepting the answer, and walks past Josh up the staircase.

<÷>

The club is dark, loud, and disgusting. Tyler couldn't look more out of place in his oversized button down and flower print shoes. Yet somehow he seems at ease, fingers barely twitching and eyes glittering in the false light.

Josh always found it fascinating how easily Tyler drew people in. They flock around him, sweat, glitter, and skin. They moan, grope, and grind.

And he thrives. 

Josh was never that open with his personal space. He lurks in the shadows by the bar, drinking cheap whiskey and brushing off any attempts men and women make for his attention. 

He doesn't want it.

He's here for Tyler. 

Always Tyler. 

Only Tyler.

The beat changes. Slow as syrup, heavy as sin, and the lights throb in time. Tyler catches Josh's eye from across the floor and smiles, dark and dangerous, right before the bass drops and the crowd blocks him from view.

Josh orders another drink.

~~~

It's been an hour.

Josh needs air.

Making his way through the oppressive surge of bodies and out the back door, he almost regrets even coming outside, despite it being part of the plan. 

Tyler is pressing some girl, long blonde hair and long tan legs against the side of the building, exposed brick fraying her cardigan as it slips off her shoulder. 

Tyler's hand hitches her thigh higher up his hip as his teeth mark the delicate lines of her neck.

She's beautiful. 

He hates her.

A soft giggle lets out of her throat between gasps and Tyler whispers something too low for Josh to hear before pulling away from the woman.

Josh hopes she goes out screaming. 

He clears his throat. 

"Hey man, I'm gonna head home, I'll see you later, alright."

"Awe, c'mon. We're having fun. Don't go yet." Tyler pleads like they haven't done this a dozen times before. 

The girl's eyes are blue. She's looking far too intensely at Josh.

"Nah, I really gotta get going. I'm tired and I have work in the morning." Josh fumbles for the keys to the car, the remaining alcohol in his system making the movements clumsy and awkward. 

He really shouldn't even be driving. 

Tyler disentangles from the woman further, reaching down to twine their fingers together.

"We'll come with. I think me and Jenna here could have some fun at the house."

The "Jenna" in question giggles again, and uses her free hand to tug the cardigan back into place before nuzzling closer to Tyler, who only tilts his head slightly at Josh with an unreadable look.

There's scratches from the brick and a stark impression of Tyler's teeth on her skin and a smudge of lipstick on his mouth.

Josh smiles.

It's brittle and fake. He hates when Tyler is like this.

"Okay. Let's go."

~~~

She goes out screaming. About that, Josh was right.

Tyler didn't even bother with his knives. As soon as they were through the threshold, tugging on each other and kissing like useless teenagers while Josh locked the door, Tyler sunk his thumbs into those pretty blue eyes of hers and bit down hard enough that her bottom lip came off in his mouth. 

He didn't even bother chewing. 

Josh sighed.

"You're getting blood on the floor. I'm not cleaning that up this time."

Tyler drops his meal and laughs, high and bright, the first genuine sound Josh had heard out of him in months.

His teeth are that poetic red again.

Jenna is still screaming, hands clawing at her face like it will bring her sight back.

Tyler turns and kicks her hard enough that her nose cracks and she slumps down unconscious to the floor.

~~~

The trip to the basement is quiet, no noises except the sound of fabric shuffling and footsteps.

Tyler still doesn't pull out his knives, instead opting to strip the girl of her clothes slowly, long tan limbs, pale tanlines, and soft skin revealed like the unwrapping of a present. 

A present Josh never even wanted. 

He thinks Tyler can tell.

It takes Jenna twenty one minutes and seventeen seconds to wake up.

It takes Tyler half that time to destroy her.

Josh watches the whole time. It's impossible to look away.

Tyler is covered in blood, the soft slope of his shoulders patterned in arterial spray from where he ripped her throat out like a wild animal, a smeared handprint over his bare chest where he attempted to wipe away the viscera and failed, the waistband of his pants soaked through maroon where he dragged her body into his lap near the end.

He's got that look in his eye again, from months ago. The soft one he uses when Josh isn't looking. 

"Come here."

Josh swallows. Stands. Shakes his head. Sits back down on the stairs.

He's scared.

Tyler makes a noise like a hum and shoves the corpse off of his lap with a wet thud and stands up.

Josh stays still, heart rate increasing with every light step Tyler's bare feet make on the floor.

Josh still can't look away. 

Tyler's eyes are voids of something Josh doesn't know if he wants to interpret, and his mouth is set in a questioning line.

"Why do you think I can't give you what you want?" Tyler questions mildly, as if he's asking what the weather is like instead of something Josh doesn't even know the full answer to at this point.

Josh looks away from his eyes. It hurts to do so.

"You just can't. It's not... it's not something you can just give me. It's not something like dinner, Tyler. It's not something you even want."

Josh's eyes flicker to the two bodies, back and forth, the congealed blood and savage violence of the first, and the uncontrolled hunger and flagrant waste of the second, before finally meeting Tyler's eyes again. 

"I see."

Tyler's voice is back to being cold and distant. His eyes are hard.

Josh feels his stomach turn and tries his best not to flinch when Tyler's fingers reach out, hovering in the air by Josh's face before settling gently, the half dried blood leaving a tacky trail over his cheekbone.

He leans in.

Josh scrambles up the stairs before their lips can meet.

Tyler doesn't follow.  
~~~

**Author's Note:**

> Lemme know what y'all think.


End file.
